TYPHOID CARRIERS 359 



by disintegrating large quantities of typhoid bacilli, filter- 

 ing, and so obtaining the intracellular constituents in 

 the filtrate, found that small doses of the latter produced 

 a transient rise of temperature in guinea-pigs and a loss 

 of weight which was soon recovered from. Animals so 

 treated were protected against a certain lethal dose of 

 typhoid bacilli, and their blood exhibited agglutinative 

 and bacteriolytic properties towards the typhoid bacillus. 

 Macfadyen * later obtained the intra- cellular juice of 

 typhoid bacilli by disintegration after freezing with liquid 

 air, and found it to be very toxic to guinea-pigs by intra- 

 peritoneal, and to rabbits by intra-venous inoculation. 

 The writer found that cultures of the Bacillus typliosus 

 do not give the " diazo " reaction. 



Survival of the typhoid bacillus in the body. Bacilli may 

 persist in the spleen for weeks, in the gall-bladder fol 

 years, and in suppurative lesions for six years or more. 

 Foster and Kayser obtained pure cultures irom the gall- 

 bladders of seven out of eight cases, and in 2 per cent, of 

 the cases this " cholecystitis typhosa " becomes a chronic 

 process, and typhoid bacilli may be discharged into 

 the bowel for long periods. Dean 2 found this to be 

 the case in a patient who had had enteric fever 

 twenty- nine years previously. Such "typhoid carriers" 

 have been the subject of much investigation recently. 3 

 A. and J. Ledingham record three instances met with in 

 an asylum in which mysterious cases of typhoid had 

 occurred 31 cases during fourteen years. Davies and 

 Walker Hall 4 relate similar outbreaks, the carrier in this 

 case being a woman who had suffered from enteric fever 

 in 1901, milk serving as the vehicle of transmission, and 



1 Proc. Roy. Soc. Lond., B. Ixxi, 1902, p. 77. 



2 Brit. Med. Journ., 1908, vol. i, p. 562. 



3 See Ledingham, Rep. Med. Off. Loc. Gov. Board for 1909-10 

 (Bibliog.) ; ibid, for 1912-13, p. 336. 



4 Proc. Roy. Soc. Med., vol. i, 1908, Epidemiolog. Sect., p. 175. 



